The global cost of oil per barrel started to decline rapidly on Wednesday afternoon as investors are evaluating a lot of factors, according to trading data.

The price of November futures on Brent oil fell by 3.09%, to $94.81 per barrel, while October futures on WTI fell by 3.24%, to $88.64. The price of oil on Wednesday afternoon shifted to a significant decline after a morning correction.

One of the reasons is the prospect of an increase in the U.S. discount rate. Tighter monetary policy may lead to a strengthening of the dollar, which is negative for oil prices, and provoke a recession, which will affect oil demand.

Besides, the continuing covid restrictions also have a negative influence on oil and gas prices, which, in its turn, also led to decrease of demand on this kind of raw materials because of toughening of restrictions on movement.

Investors also pay attention to the American Petroleum Institute (API) statistics, according to which the U.S. commercial oil inventories rose by 0.6 million barrels in the previous week.

Earlier, we reported that Saudi oil and gas companies increased production by 1% in June and exports by 2.1%.